Hello loves and Happy New Year! (This is a pretty late "Happy New Year", but you all get my point). In this week's video, I wanted to share with you all a personal list of mine that I created to remind myself of the things I need to keep track of this year. I wanted to hold myself accountable for certain things I want to make habits of mine of in 2016 (and for, you know, the rest of life). These are the changes that I think are worth making in my life and I hope you all enjoy! Comment down below and let me know what your goals/resolutions are for 2016 and as always, thanks for reading and watching!

             

               My roommate and I have been moved into our apartment for about three months now and there have been so many benefits to having an apartment. We don't have to pay for laundry anymore. We're free to eat whatever food we want to and we're not stuck eating only food from the dining halls. We have a lot more personal space than we did when we were living in the dorm rooms. It's been pretty awesome thus far. However, seeing as how this was our first apartment, there were a lot of things that went into preparing for getting an apartment that we weren't necessarily ready for.
               In today's video, I've compiled a list of the top ten things I wished I'd known before moving into an apartment (Click HERE to see the video on YouTube). Getting your first apartment is a huge milestone in life and it's fun and exciting, but it can also be a little scary,especially if you're not prepared. With that being said, I hope this video can help somebody else out there!


             

               Be sure to leave a comment down below (or in the "Comments" section of YouTube if you're watching the video on that platform) with any other tips or advice that you have that I may not have mentioned in the video. Please feel free to follow any of my social media links with any questions, concerns, comments, praise and accolades (just kidding...ish), etc. Thanks for stopping by!

With love,

               Well, hello there, beautiful people! I know, I know. I've been gone for a few months and I've been taking a hiatus from blogging for a while. But now I'm back! I'm just going to be completely honest with you guys and admit that the main reason why I haven't been blogging is because I just haven't felt motivated. The semester started off pretty badly and it took me nearly halfway through the semester so far to get myself back on the right track. But nonetheless, here I am.
               There have been a few other personal struggles that I've been experiencing that's kept me from blogging, but I might save that as more of an update in another blog post. But I'm very glad to be back doing what I love and communicating with you guys because I've really needed that. I've had quite a few ideas and I'm glad that I am now in a much better head space in order to execute them. It's been over a year since I started this blog. My first post was published on September 29th of last year, I believe. And I really haven't been blogging as much as I said I would. But I want that to change. I need that to change. So that's what I'm going to start doing.

               I've (not so) recently started another semester of school and I wanted to share with you guys an updated look on what I keep in my backpack. But this time, I'm not just going to describe what's in my bag. I want to show you! With that being said, I'd like to announce that I've officially launched a new YouTube channel. There's only a couple of videos on it, including this one, but it's finally here! I've been wanting to start a channel for years, but never did for a number of reasons (excuses). And now I have. You can watch the video down below or visit my channel to go check it out.
             

               I'm not quite sure yet how often I will be uploading videos. I will keep blogging weekly and maybe add a video every other week or keep it weekly just like the blogs. But we'll see what happens.
               I really hope that you enjoy the video! Comment down below and let me know what you think!

With love from your girl,

             
               Today I wanted to talk about something that's been on my mind for a while, but I never addressed. I actually thought that it would be kind of awkward to address this now because the term "basic" isn't new anymore, but let's be real; I'm super lame and I feel like I always try to keep phrases around that people are kind of over. I'm still not ready for "Yaasss" to be over because that one word pronounced that way is basically a way of life for me.
               But today I wanted to discuss being "basic" and what it really means... literally I'm asking you because I have no idea and I think the term is actually quite pointless. It's seen as negative, but I think the term altogether is just misleading. Let's break down what it means to be "basic". I mean, there's the obvious characteristics: Starbucks, leggings and Uggs in the fall and winter months, iPhones, mainstream music, etc. I've never seriously sat down and thought about whether or not I was "basic", but am I supposed to be? Because I actually love all those things (minus the Ugg boots; I can't afford Uggs, but I'll rock some Payless knock offs!). But seriously, does liking popular things mean that your only goal is to be like everybody else, that you have no personality, or that all of your purchases and likes/dislikes are put in place by the fact that everyone around you likes it too? Can you not just like Beyonce because you actually like Beyonce? Because I freaking LOVE Beyonce and I don't think that's just because she's popular right now (and has been for a while actually); I genuinely like her. But even if I did only listen to music on the Billboard Top 100 chart and I only shopped at certain stores and I spent way too much money on Starbucks every day, would that mean every other quality about me is forgotten because of where and how I choose to spend my money or my free time? Because I think that's bullsh*t.
               I chose to talk about this after a conversation that I had with a friend who told me not to look into buying an iPhone because everyone else has one. His argument was that Android phones (preferably Samsung's flagship phones) allow users to have a completely customized and unique experience and that I wouldn't be conforming (yes, he used the word "conforming") to other people's standards of what a good phone is supposed to be... yeah... However, that's an argument for an entirely different post.  Despite the fact that it's a freaking phone, he genuinely thought that I wanted an iPhone because I know a lot of people that have them and I wanted to feel like everybody else. But I'm not in 7th grade and those things don't matter to me. At the end of the day, it's just a phone. And that was just one of many conversations that we've had like this.
               I understand being different and I completely advocate that. But more importantly, I advocate just being yourself. And if that's different (depending on whatever your definition of different is) then that's great. If you're into alternative music, fashion, ways of living your life, then do you if that's just who you are. Similarly, if you like to stay up to date on the latest trends and you know the lyrics to every new song that comes on the radio right when it comes out, then that's great too. And if you're like me and you don't fit on one exact side of the spectrum, then that's great too. I just don't think it's worth it to go out of your way to like or dislike something because you want people to see you a certain way when it comes to trivial things like what you eat or what music you listen to or what clothes you wear. If you like it, you like it. And if you don't, you don't. Just do what makes you happy and don't worry about labels or putting yourself in a box. And as cliche as it sounds, normal is overrated anyway because even if you can't see it on the outside, everyone is unique, everyone has a story, and everyone is important and shouldn't just be dismissed because they choose to or choose not to drink Starbucks every day.
               Thinking about this, it's kind of weird that I'm writing this entire post because someone told me not to buy an iPhone, but I think that's kind of where this way of thinking stems from... trivial things. And believe it or not, some people take this stuff seriously (and get really freaking hard core defensive about their phones). And obviously, I'm not referring to everyone because I know that not everyone thinks this way. I just see the word "basic" used to degrade other people so often that it gets really irritating to witness. So what if I want an iPhone? And who cares if I love Starbucks?  Does that make me boring? (Yes, I am boring but not because of that). Am I unsophisticated, uncreative, lacking uniqueness, stuck up, or self absorbed? Hell no. We all like/dislike our own things and all of our feelings about things are rightfully valid to us. We're all people.
#NoJudgementZone (Can we tweet that?)  :-D

               That's all I have for today. As I mentioned in my previous post, I'll be posting some of my favorite links to blog posts on Friday. Don't forget to leave any comments/questions/concerns in the comments section below or hit me up on my social media links (found in the sidebar). You stay awesome.
With love from your girl,

               Okay so I'm completely aware that I have been so behind on publishing contest for this site and for that I apologize. I know I've been really MIA lately, but life has been crazy. Actually, it hasn't been that bad; I've just been having a hard time trying to figure out how to fit a blogging schedule into my new summer schedule. Let me explain what's been going on this summer.

Work
This summer I started working my very first job... like ever. My job is pretty mundane, but it isn't too difficult. But when I come home after a full day, I'm exhausted. It's not just blogging that I've been falling behind on. Working this job has me falling behind on life basically. I've been so tired and worn out, I got to the point where I would just pile on mascara for my entire makeup routine and call it a day. I even stopped caring about my hair and rocked a beanie for almost an entire month. It was scary. So there's that...

Bret Michaels
Sweet Jesus. My aunt randomly invited me to see Bret Michaels. Apparently she won some tickets to his concert at work and it was amazing! I'm pretty sure everyone's mom was there, but I had the time of my life. And you can't go wrong with discount daiquiris!



John Mulaney
John Mulaney, for those of you who may not know, is a comedic genius who has shaped the entire friendship of my closest friends and I. We're obsessed with him, like to the point where we quote him subconsciously. It's actually a little creepy sometimes. He's one of my favorite comedians EVER and we got to go to the live recording of his upcoming Comedy Central Special. If you happen to catch it, you can probably hear me screaming from the balcony seats when he mentions HGTV. Just saying... (I really freaking love HGTV by the way).



Six Flags
Every year, my family and I go to Six Flags as a sort of small family vacation. We usually go to the Six Flags in Gurnie Illinois, but this year we're going to the one in St. Louis. Planning for that has been crazy and taking up a lot more time than I would've hoped it would.

SRtrends
Even though content has been very scarce on this site, I've still been working on other sites. I'm currently a Campus Coordinator at a website called SRtrends.com., which is a great  site full of  amazing articles created for college students by college students. So far, I have two articles published there and you can check them out here and go ahead and explore the rest of the site as well!

               So that's all that's been going on for now. I've also decided to start posting more content every week. I'll still keep posting my usual content on Monday, but I'm thinking that I can also publish posts on Fridays. The reason for this is to share content from other blogs and websites (yes, including SRtrends) that I think is helpful or entertaining. I love reading other blogs and I'd love to share links to other interesting articles with you guys. Also, if any of you guys have a blog or know of a blog and/or blog content that you'd like to suggest to me, go ahead and leave a comment down below or you can share it with me on any of my social media platforms. I'd love to talk to you guys!
With love from your girl,